MCH Lesson #1 – See What You Can Do

I’ve never felt that I learned as much or took as much away from an event where I was a speaker as I did yesterday. I was in Miami speaking at the annual strategic planning event for the senior executives of the Miami Children’s Hospital, and over the next couple of days I’ll share some of the more poignant lessons.

Let’s start with their mascot, Lance.
His back legs became paralyzed during a spinal operation he had to have 2 years ago. His owner, Caio, told me that he just decided he had to make something good happen out of this painful situation. So he got what he refers to as Lance’s bicycle. (This Lance’s namesake was also known for riding a bicycle and achieving greatness after suffering a medical crisis.) Then he enrolled in the therapy dog program at MCH. He wanted to show the kids that even if your health issue leaves you less than 100%, you can still do amazing things.

MCH Mascot Logo

The kids loved him. He became the hit of the therapy dog program. He even became a cartoon complete with his own comic book that Caio hands out to the kids.

Caio told me that some said he should put the dog down instead of have the surgery, that Lance would have a lousy life and it wasn’t worth it to put him through that. They said Lance would be miserable that he couldn’t run around the way he used to.

Then Caio said this:
Dogs don’t think about what they can’t do. They just see what they can do, and they go and do it.